It’s been a chaotic 24 hours since President Donald Trump announced he had tested positive for Covid-19 — and some gaps in the timeline are raising questions.
Early Friday morning, Trump tweeted that he had tested positive. His physician said shortly afterward that the President was doing well, and would continue his recovery at the White House.
Later that morning, White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows spoke to reporters, saying Trump was experiencing moderate symptoms, but was very energetic and in high spirits.
Late in the afternoon, the President’s physician said Trump was fatigued, had received a dose of the experimental Regeneron treatment, and would be taken to Walter Reed hospital.
“That raises the question of what happened in that 18-hour period, and to what extent did the President’s symptoms develop to the point where his doctors felt he needed to be brought to the hospital?” said CNN’s White House Correspondent Jeremy Diamond.
“But not only that, but for the President himself to agree with those recommendations and to agree that the benefits of coming to the hospital far outweighed the negatives and projecting an image of weakness rather than the strength he likes to project.”
By Friday night, the physician announced Trump had also received the experimental remdesivir drug. Trump tweeted from hospital that it was “going well, I think!”
“We need more transparency than this,” said emergency physician Leana Wen. “There are so many missing pieces, I’m struggling to make sense of it.”
How infection develops: It usually takes five to seven days to develop coronavirus symptoms, then five to eight days to start showing severe symptoms like shortness of breath, Wen said.
For the President to reach the point of needing treatment and hospital stays within 24 hours of diagnosis — a process that usually takes two weeks — “isn’t making sense,” she added.